Considering bringing your car to Balanced Performance? Look elsewhere.

[Dmn2258]

I apologize if this is in the wrong section, mods feel free to move it.

Before I get into this, I just want to say I understand that nobody is perfect, and mistakes do happen. I am a very laid back and understanding person.

With that said, when people are spending more money than they should on a dyno tune and other work, the shop should help the customers out who keep them in business.

I'm not sure if anyone on here has taken their cars to be tuned at Balanced Performance, but I can't say I'm too impressed. I brought my freshly 1.8 swapped AE101 Individual Throttle Body 1993 Miata in to get tuned, and turns out their best tuner Ed was out of town. I was disappointed, but figured I would still be getting a quality tune. Now I regret not bringing my car elsewhere.

I'm embarrased to say I ended up spending $800+ on a "tune" and a wideband o2 install. (they also have a BS ~$150 strap down fee which other tuning places don't have at all). Looking at their facebook page, it appears (from the types of cars) that a lot of wealthy individuals take their cars in to this shop and probably don't care as much about their overpriced work.

If the tune was good and the work was flawless then I wouldn't be bitching as much. I was very excited to have my car back on the road, but noticed that after the tune my car still bogged down quite a bit and the tune seemed way too rich. My GM IAT sensor was apparently not working from the beginning (stuck on 70 degrees) and I would have thought they would notice that, considering they took their sweet time tuning my car. I had to remind the tuner to sync the carbs as well when I noticed my engine was quite shaky during the tune (that seemed to help a little bit).

I also had a problem with my Innovate MTX-L a couple hours after they installed it. The gauge was stuck on HTR and I found out they didn't seat the sensor connector in correctly so it came loose. My cig lighter/socket also stopped working after the install. These were both small errors, but were quite inconvenient considering I paid $380 for them to install a damn wideband.

I called up Jason and stated the issues I'd had. I told him I was not pleased with the tune and the wideband had some issues. I was hoping he could help me out with a free re-tune since they had already caused me enough trouble. This did not happen and all he said he could do was cut the price down to $100/hr for a re-tune. He said he would give me a call back the next day to schedule an appointment, but I never got a call.

After spending $800+ for inferior work, I am fed up and bringing my car elseware (probably mainstream or topspeed). I understand that Ed may be a busy man since he is supposively a great tuner, but that doesn't mean the quality of work/tuning should be sacrificed. I also ended up fixing the wideband issue myself since I didn't feel like driving an hour back there anyways.

I'm not saying they don't know what they're doing, I just don't think I was treated very fairly. I know megasquirt is usually more expensive to tune, but for the amount I spent I was expecting a somewhat flawless tune. Let me know if you guys think. FYI I'm not the only one who has had issues with this shop either.

[revsk8erdude]

i had my car tuned at balanced and i am EXTREMELY pleased with the work. it was done by Chris Anderson. i dont know the jason fellow you were referring to, but when Chris did mine, he was very professional and did a bang up job. no regrets, no problems down the road, no issues.. nothing but good things to say.

[Dmn2258]

i had my car tuned at balanced and i am EXTREMELY pleased with the work. it was done by Chris Anderson. i dont know the jason fellow you were referring to, but when Chris did mine, he was very professional and did a bang up job. no regrets, no problems down the road, no issues.. nothing but good things to say.

I'm glad you had a good experience. Jason is the owner. I'm not going to say who tuned my car because I understand that mistakes do happen and I don't want anyone losing their job over this.

[Dmn2258]

It was just brought to my attention that Ed doesn't even work at Balanced Performance anymore, so don't waste your time people!

[B18c1Turboed]

Chris Anderson owns ARD Motorsports in Flowery branch. These are to separate shops. I stopped using balanced once Ed
Was to busy to tune my cars. I started having Chris Anderson tune it on dyno and the track and never looked back agin.

Only thing balanced had going for it was Ed tuning cars. They suck at everything else and are extremely overpriced.

[1civic]

No ED = No Care!!



P.S
we are running out of good shops in GA. I hear bad stuff all the time, from poor installs, to crap engine builds, such a shame too!!

[RandomGuy]

i had my car tuned at balanced and i am EXTREMELY pleased with the work. it was done by Chris Anderson. i dont know the jason fellow you were referring to, but when Chris did mine, he was very professional and did a bang up job. no regrets, no problems down the road, no issues.. nothing but good things to say.

I've seen a lot of Ed's work (mainly DSM's) and he's one of the better tuners in Atlanta. On top of that, he's pretty good with Megasquirt which isn't too common in ATL. Another person in ATL who's pretty good is Scott Siegel who was at Subaru of Gwinnett.


After spending $800+ for inferior work, I am fed up and bringing my car elseware (probably mainstream or topspeed). I understand that Ed may be a busy man since he is supposively a great tuner, but that doesn't mean the quality of work/tuning should be sacrificed. I also ended up fixing the wideband issue myself since I didn't feel like driving an hour back there anyways. (TurboDave and Scotty both tuned my megasquirt car at Mainstream Performance and it was awesome)



If the tune was good and the work was flawless then I wouldn't be bitching as much. I was very excited to have my car back on the road, but noticed that after the tune my car still bogged down quite a bit and the tune seemed way too rich. My GM IAT sensor was apparently not working from the beginning (stuck on 70 degrees) and I would have thought they would notice that, considering they took their sweet time tuning my car. I had to remind the tuner to sync the carbs as well when I noticed my engine was quite shaky during the tune (that seemed to help a little bit).

If your IAT reading is off that can mess up your tune. Unless you paid extra for diagnostics and troubleshooting, why should they have to hunt down issues outside of a tune? You bring a running car in for a tune and they tune it as-is.

Did you spend 950 or 800? You did say there was a $150 strap down fee and also a wideband o2 sensor labor charge- what was that? Does that mean the labor on the tune was ~500?

Last note, you mentioned it's a miata. You should really hit up DIYAutoTune. There are a lot of local miata's that run megasquirt. The user base is awesome and I'm sure there's someone with a similar setup who has a map somewhere. DIYAutoTune is ALWAYS swamped with big stuff and orders, but I'd see if they'd have any time to tune your car. I'm sure two hours of their time would be superior to anything else, given they're on the top of their game in Megasquirt, Miatas, and Megasquirt Miatas.

Side note I know John from Garage Zero can do a quick megasquirt street tune that's awesome.

[Dmn2258]

Ed did NOT tune my car just FYI. He doesn't work at balanced anymore and it almost seems like they are baiting people by using his name.

@randomguy my IAT reading is stuck at 70. The sensor is not working at all. All I would've hoped is that they could have noticed that it wasn't working.

I spent almost $900 total. I'm bitching about the strap down fee because if I went somewhere else such as mainstream they don't have that at all. Labor on the wideband install was $380 for something they told me would take "a couple" hours.

I've been in touch with DIY ever since I got the Megasquirt. I was hoping to have them tune it but they don't have time to tune cars anymore apparently. They are the ones that referred me to balanced performance unfortunately. I'm on a ton of miata forums so I realize how many people run megasquirt. Unfortunately every car is different so I'm not really trying to use someone else's tune especially after I already paid someone to (try) to do it.

The main reason for me posting this is so I can save people some money who are wanting to get their car tuned.

[iamdallas]

Order a pre-made gmiat pigtail from DIY, it'll fix that issue. The home-brew one with the kit is a bitch and constantly comes unseated. But it isn't going to throw off your tune that much.


Did you ask for a tune for peak power? If so, they may just have added fuel to stop detonation so that you could run more timing... But you shouldn't have that issue at cruising speeds. Don't be afraid to adjust fuel req at cruising speed now. You can't really harm anything as long as you don't lean it out to much. You can use VE analyzer and restrict the parameters to certain parts of your VE table.

[Vteckidd]

The strap down fee is legit. Its a minimum fee because what you dont understand is tons of dickhead kids bring their cars into get tuned and claim all is well, then expect the tuner to diagnose the cars problems when its not running correctly.

Take your IAT sensor, that's your problem. Tuners are not mechanics and diagnostics people per se. You should have made sure your CaR was 100% before you brought it in.

The fact they were incompetent at tuning is a separate argument . if you really want Ed, then wait for him. Or vet other tuners.

I hate when people are too lazy to do proper research then bash a shop because of their ineptness .

[Dmn2258]

Talked to DIY autotune and they said my IAT sensor issue wouldn't affect the tune all that much. Thanks for your feedback though and hopefully you weren't saying I'm a lazy kid because you don't even know me. The fact is balanced is overpriced. Like I've said several times, Ed doesn't work there anymore either, and they keep telling people he's "out of town".

And why don't places like mainstream have strap down fees? Their hourly rate is pretty much the same...

I'm not the only one who feels this way about this shop, FYI.

[1civic]

Talked to DIY autotune and they said my IAT sensor issue wouldn't affect the tune all that much. Thanks for your feedback though and hopefully you weren't saying I'm a lazy kid because you don't even know me. The fact is balanced is overpriced. Like I've said several times, Ed doesn't work there anymore either, and they keep telling people he's "out of town".

And why don't places like mainstream have strap down fees? Their hourly rate is pretty much the same...

I'm not the only one who feels this way about this shop, FYI.

Vteckidd has a point since most cars are not ready for tune, BUT!!!!

A tuner should know to check timing, and sensor functions before a tune is attempted!

IMO!!

[Dmn2258]

My car used to have a 1.6 engine in it with megasquirt and AFM delete and the IAT had been working before I had Rspeed (miata shop) swap the 1.8+ITBs in. I guess I should not have assumed it was working. I had the car towed directly from Rspeed to Balanced. Aside from the IAT, the car was ready to be tuned.

[Vteckidd]

The strap down fee is a mandatory fee, like a shop minimum.

Balanced, like you said, caters to a high priced clientele. They dont want to fuck with your miata or Honda unless its a spec race car. They just dont care. So they charge a $150 fee so when you make your appt, and roll up with your VTECK YO! and the car is pouring smoke out of the back and throwing 15 CEL, they say, THANKS FOR WASTING OUR TIME, YOU OWE US $150.

Its to drive the kids away. If you dont like it, thats great, DONT PAY IT, go somewhere else.

FYI Mainstream does charge that fee, IIRC Scotty has a minimum 1 hour fee , the second he straps your car on the dyno, he starts charging you whether hes tuning or not. Your car has issues, you pay for it.

I do agree that a seasoned tuner should have known the IAT sensor was stuck at 70 degrees. But thats also your fault for you not making sure the car was 100% before tuning. Your best weapon in this industry is knowing more than the guy working on your car.

You could have had them stop at any point im sure.

I just dont see the point in blaming a shop when clearly you are 50% to blame as well

[Vteckidd]

Talked to DIY autotune and they said my IAT sensor issue wouldn't affect the tune all that much. Thanks for your feedback though and hopefully you weren't saying I'm a lazy kid because you don't even know me. The fact is balanced is overpriced. Like I've said several times, Ed doesn't work there anymore either, and they keep telling people he's "out of town".

And why don't places like mainstream have strap down fees? Their hourly rate is pretty much the same...

I'm not the only one who feels this way about this shop, FYI.

Its overpriced, but yet you chose to go there and pay their prices. Makes sense

You wanted Ed to tune your car, but chose to have someone NOT Ed tune it instead. Makes sense.

I ran mainstream for 3 years, I know what they charge. I know balanced very well, I also ran Baltground, and worked with several other shops in the area.

Im giving you golden advice, vet every shop, trust no one, and make your own informed decisions and live with the consequences. SOunds like you settled for the wrong shop and the wrong tuner, that was YOUR choice.

[Dmn2258]

You speak the truth. I guess I just didn't like the way you worded things at first. In all honesty this is the first time I've heavily modified a car and the first time I've had a car tuned so I'm just learning from my mistakes.

All I can hope is others don't make the same mistake that I did by going to this shop. A bunch of my friends recommended mainstream an I should've listened to them. Ill have to let DIYAutotune know not to refer people to balanced anymore.

[Vteckidd]

You speak the truth. I guess I just didn't like the way you worded things at first. In all honesty this is the first time I've heavily modified a car and the first time I've had a car tuned so I'm just learning from my mistakes.

All I can hope is others don't make the same mistake that I did by going to this shop. A bunch of my friends recommended mainstream an I should've listened to them. Ill have to let DIYAutotune know not to refer people to balanced anymore.

Can you explain to me your car in more detail? Just a daily driver? SPEC Miata? etc?

Why ITBs?

Maybe I can give you more help based on more info. Details , goals, etc

[Dmn2258]

my car is a daily driver. I was tired of how slow my stock 1.6 was and I thought ITB's were awesome. I've "upgraded" pretty much everything on the car since I've got it. ITB kits such as the Jenvey and Fuji are usually very expensive so I wasn't very interested in those especially since I would be making minimal power gains. I ended up finding out that Techno Toy Tuning sells an ITB adapter for the AE101 silvertops and AE111 blacktops. The price difference is pretty awesome and that's one of the reasons I went with this setup.

Eventually I want to do turbo+ITB's but right now I am cool with just enjoying the throttle response and awesome sound it makes haha.

[Vteckidd]

ITBs are kind of fools gold to be honest. I have extensive experience with All Motor (albeit mainly Honda).

ITBs will take a TON OF TIME to tune correctly. Im really not sure there is any REAL tuner besides Ed that has enough experience All Motor to tune them correctly. Thats not a shot at anyone locally, but ITBs are extremely finicky and usually require top notch engine management to make them run right. Not sure I trust megasquirt (isnt it like Chrome? freeware?)

Individual cylinder tuning is the best way to do it and thats a pain in the ass, expect 10-20 hours of COMPETENT tuning.

A stock internals motor, prob not so much. You would honestly see more power from a properly sized Intake manifold and cams/header than the "bling" factor of ITBs. ITBs dont necessarily make power either. That is the biggest misconception with them. People think they add this rediculous power, they dont. You usually will achieve a fatter midrange, but at the expense of drivability.

May want to rethink your strategy. IF the motor is stock, youll see a much better drivable car from I/H/E and a Rear end gear than ITBs alone.